For an instant, Angela Bancroft was scared.

Part of the opening wave at the recent Zone Urban Epic triathlon in Portland, Bancroft dove into the chilly Casco Bay water. The swim began on Mackworth Island, and was advertised as a straight shot to East End Beach, and a recent news item on the race's Web site listed the current that day as "favorable."

"Our wave started, and from the accounts I've heard from people watching us, we all started as a pack," Bancroft, of Paris, said. "Then we all dispersed and became more and more off-course. The current was very strong that day, and it took us way far away."

Bancroft was one of a few swimmers who made it to the first set of marker buoys in that first wave, fighting the current all the way.

Then she got caught.

"I had to work, work, work to make it around the buoy, and as soon as I got around it, the current swept me underneath it," Bancroft recalled. "I flipped on my back and I was pushing the buoy off my face. I'm never scared in the water, but I was at that moment, I was very scared. But I did get loose, and the rest of the swim went well."

Later during the race, Bancroft was pedaling during the 40-kilometer biking section when she nearly missed a turn, applied the brakes and flipped over the handlebars.

"I landed on my head and cut up my arms," Bancroft said. "Again, though, I was able to regroup and continue on, and the rest of the race went very well."

Well? Try fifth place overall.

Of course, that paled in comparison to Bancroft's first-place finish at the Scarborough Tri two weeks earlier, another Maine-based sprint triathlon featuring an ocean swim.

"I did have fun there," Bancroft said. "The surf was way up that day, people were saying 6-foot, 7-foot swells, and people were getting flipped over getting out."

A week later, Bancroft skipped over to Bethel, where she placed second in the Maine State Triathlon.

"I love the races around home," Bancroft said. "It's a very fun scene, a great environment. I love being part of it all."

Many triathletes begin participating in these three-sport endurance races based on a love for running, or general fitness. For many participants, running and cycling are strengths, and the swimming portion of the race takes time to develop and master.

Bancroft had it backwards.

As a youngster, Bancroft was active in her Cape Elizabeth swimming community. She swam for her local Y, and for Cape Elizabeth High School, and parlayed that experience into four years of swimming at the University of Vermont.

"After college, though, competitive swimming ended for me," Bancroft said.

She graduated in 1992, and started to find new ways to stay in shape. She began to run, taking part in "a few road races here and there."

"My first marathon was in 1994," Bancroft said. "I can't really remember what drove me to try a marathon. I've always been the kind of person who needed a goal, something to shoot for. After college swimming, I found that I needed something. It's just been part of who I am for so long."

Most young children learn to ride a bicycle, and for most, getting back on later in life is, well, like riding a bike, it all comes back.

Riding a road bicycle in a competitive environment, however, is altogether different.

"I had no idea about biking," Bancroft said. "None at all."

Out of college, Bancroft had competed in one triathlon, and used a mountain bike she had with her at UVM. She tried it again a year later, borrowing a friend's road bike. Finally, it was her brother, Jeff, that helped her make the leap.

"He was doing them for a few years, and I said, 'You know, I think I could do this, and it would be fun,'" Bancroft said. "I headed down and bought myself a road bike."

This was just two years ago, in 2006. And learning, unfortunately for Bancroft, came the hard way.

"I had a few races that season, in 2006," Bancroft said, "then I crashed, in August, and severely injured my shoulder."

With a torn rotator cuff, Bancroft was sidelined for a while. She had surgery over the winter, and last year participated in numerous triathlons in 2007.

"It's taken a few years to get better at (bicycle racing), and I still have so much to learn," Bancroft said. "Many people can ride a bike, you learn when you're small, but there's a lot to racing a bike. It's one thing to ride it, and it's another to learn how to go fast."

As with many things in life, Bancroft, who finds time to train with three children, ages 4, 6 and 8, there appears to be a natural progression to her triathlon ventures. Many of her races in recent years have been of the sprint variety.

This weekend, though, Bancroft will attempt to tackle a half-Ironman race - the Timberman 70.3 in Gilford, N.H. - in which the distances in each discipline are much longer: a 1.2-mile swim, a 56-mile bike and a 13.1-mile run.

"My A-race this summer is the Timberman," Bancroft said. "I had to focus and plan my race schedule around that, being able to train properly for that and rest up for that."

In addition to the New Hampshire race, Bancroft has also signed up for a full Ironman Triathlon next summer in Lake Placid, N.Y. That triathlon asks competitors to swim 2.4 miles, bike 112 miles and run a full marathon distance of 26.2 miles.

"I suppose that means I have at least one more marathon left in me," Bancroft said.

And where Lake Placid is land-locked, there aren't likely to be any ocean buoys waiting to pull her off course, either.